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General Review.

AIR SITUATION.

47. Slight improvement in the weather enabled our bombers to resume night operations on a heavier scale than had been possible during recent weeks. Attacks on enemy shipping were continued by day and by night.

Enemy activity against this country continued at a low level.

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In Malaya and Burma attacks by Japanese aircraft were directed against our aerodromes, several of which were evacuated.

In Libya our aircraft provided effective support for our ground forces, and heavily attacked enemy communications.

Germany and Occupied Territory.

Day.

48. Bomber Command despatched 34 sorties. Fighter Command flew 57 sorties against shipping and over occupied territory. Attacks on shipping are reported under "Coastal Operations."

49. Three Coastal Command Beauforts bombed the Donges oil refinery at St. Nazaire, starting fires among oil containers. Spitfires carried out promising attacks on barges at Nieuport and on two railway trains near Calais.

Night.

50. Bomber Command despatched 548 sorties and dropped a total of 553 tons of H.E. bombs and 22,380 incendiaries. Our aircraft operated every night except one, the principal objectives being the enemy warships at Brest, the docks and town of Wilhelmshaven, and Channel ports.

51. Brest was attacked on six nights by a total of 167 aircraft, which dropped 277 tons of H.E. bombs, including nine of 4,000 lbs. and 39 of 2,000 lbs. A number of these were seen to burst in the dock area and one 4,000-lb. bomb caused a particularly large explosion, followed by a red glow; a number of fires were also reported, but intense darkness and efficient smoke screens made it impossible to observe whether the battlecruisers were hit.

52. Seventy-one tons of H.E. bombs (including three of 4,000 lbs.) and 10,600 incendiaries were dropped on Wilhelmshaven during a raid by 69 bombers. Numerous fires resulted, and bomb-bursts were seen near the main railway station and the docks and in the North-Eastern and the Western parts of the

town.

53. Attacks on a lighter scale were made against Ostend, Havre, Cherbourg and Cologne.

United Kingdom.

54. Fighter Command flew 1,436 sorties by day and 532 sorties by night. Enemy operations were on a small scale, comparable with those of the previous week. An insignificant number of aircraft penetrated inland.

Coastal Operations.

Coastal Command flew 228 patrols (362 sorties) and provided 33 convoy escorts (76 additional sorties). Shipping protection patrols by Fighter Command totalled 506 (1,259 sorties).

56. Hudsons sank a 1,200-ton ship off Haugesund, and reported hits on an 8,000-ton merchant vessel off Texel and another of 4,000 tons off Ameland. Beauforts and Beaufighters, escorted by long-range Spitfires, attacked a convoy off the Dutch coast; a Flak ship was hit and other ships damaged.

57. Thirty-five aircraft were despatched to lay sea-mines off Brest and in. the Jade and Weser rivers; ten of these operated by day.

58. The results of enemy operations against shipping were negligible, apart from minelaying, which cannot yet be assessed. Four attacks on shipping

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